Humility and Ambition

Humility

and Ambition Brother Mark Award Winner Jiexi Lin Looks to the Future

Admired by her classmates from Our Lady of Good Counsel High School’s Class of 2022, Jiexi Lin ’22 is perpetually busy, working to improve the world as she learns about it.

At Good Counsel, she was involved with the Global Buddies club, which pairs international students attending GC with American students to help with the transition from a foreign high school. Lin, who is from China, came to the U.S. in her sophomore year to study at GC.

Lin was well liked by her classmates; she was voted “friendliest student,” according to the 2022 yearbook. Also, she won a speech contest that gave her the honor of speaking at the end-of-year senior awards assembly during her last week of high school.

But the biggest honor she received was at graduation, when she was honored with the Brother Mark Award. Named for the school’s founding principal, it is given each year to an outstanding senior who has given the most of herself or himself to make Good Counsel an exceptional school.

“When my name was called as the award winner during the ceremony, I could not believe it. Each of the students in the Class of 2022 is special in some way,” Lin says.

“I am really sincerely honored by this award,” Lin says. “I want to say a big thank you to my GC community. It feels like a school filled with possibilities, and I am grateful for my three years there.” She is especially thankful to her friends, family, host family, teachers and the GC community. “Without the support of this group, I wouldn’t be who I am today,” she says.

In the fall, Lin is headed to the College of William & Mary, where she will have a double major of international relations and economics. With the knowledge she gains, she hopes to work to promote peace throughout the world.

During the summer of 2022, she took a course at the college to get a jumpstart on her secondary education. She also traveled to see more of the U.S. “I have been in America for three years, but have only seen D.C., Maryland and Virginia,” Lin said shortly after graduation. “I want to explore more, maybe take a car trip to Pennsylvania with my host parents to learn more about America and its culture.” Bria Bourgeois, Lin’s college counselor at GC, says Lin truly embodies the meaning of the Brother Mark Award.

“Her passion for helping others speaks measures,” Bourgeois says. “From the first day that I met her, I knew that she was one day going to make a huge difference in this world. As I got to know her, I understood her desire to help people. In her senior year, I watched her blossom into a young woman who is confident and ready to take on everything life has coming her way. I am so thankful that I was able to meet her on her way to greatness.”

Lin says she is grateful for the friends she has made at GC and for all of her classmates, because she feels each of them also deserves to win the award. “They are unique and have special qualities. I am grateful for their presence.”